Since the dawn of cinema, “weirdos” have had a strong and consistent presence on the silver screen. While social norms are not always expressed explicitly, within film they suddenly become clear. The weirdos of film that we know and love, Amélie, Willy Wonka, Harold and/or Maude are isolated characters: sequestered and singled out, sometimes by choice, all because they have been deemed “different”. These weirdos, loners, oddballs, whatever you’d like to call them, are only as accepted as their creators allow them to be. Weirdness is in the eye of the beholder, and because of this, the weirdos of cinema run the gamut from just kinda quirky to complete social outcasts. The isolation of the pandemic has prompted me to reexamine certain societal expectations that existed in the world we once knew, and how the isolating experience of being socially outcasted is depicted on screen. From this weirdo’s perspective, portrayals of outcasts are far more interesting and garner more sustained adoration than narratives of normalcy. Regardless of our age, class, race, or upbringing, we all can identify with the underdog, and root for the smallest, scrappiest characters. Weirdness breeds innovation, excitement, and inspiration. And yet, the way weirdness is represented is often limited.
The weirdos that get to be at the center of a story are often so pigeon-holed into their odd boxes that, despite any character development that may occur along the way, said weirdos are sometimes prevented from becoming dynamic and end up as mere caricatures. Weirdos are often delegated to the role of the best friend, or similarly, the comic relief, utilized in a way that affirms the normalcy of the protagonist. A weirdo will do whatever a weirdo does: usually for the sake of making us laugh, and perhaps for the sake of making the audience feel better about their own otherness. And if a weirdo isn’t being tokenized for their weirdness, they are typically sent on a journey to coolness, wherein their previous identity is washed away, sometimes even risking villianhood for the chance to be accepted (Arnie from Christine, Fern from Jawbreaker). It’s quite hard to make a story about a weirdo without being exploitative — I believe a film can attempt to celebrate subversiveness and arrive at that lens unintentionally, as in The Disaster Artist. But there’s a way to tell a story about weirdos with weirdos in mind, in a way that can be humanizing.
One auteur that has mastered the art of weirdness is Craig Gillespie, whose depictions of weirdos have always been thoughtful and considerate and in my view, utterly unique. Gillespie doesn’t portray weirdness simply to point a finger at someone and say “look at this weirdo”, he instead dares to point a finger at his audience and question why they might perceive someone as weird in the first place. I can think of no better example of this pure kind of representation than his 2007 film Lars and the Real Girl. No other movie about a weirdo has felt this… normal. It exists in a very small category of films that tell the stories of outcasts, with no ulterior motive. There is a peaceful, solemn quality to this film, similar to what Spike Jonze achieved with his film Her, and yet it feels even more warm and familiar to me here. From the outside, Lars and the Real Girl could easily be a deeply depressing film, told within an isolating, bleak lens. Before I viewed the film I was certain that this lonely character who falls in love with a sex doll would be scrutinized or gawked at, only to realize upon finally watching it that Lars is celebrated, accepted, and thus normalized.
Lars and the Real Girl is a movie made with love. It looks in the face of the normies who think they’ve got it figured out, and asks: Why do you question the somewhat odd behavior of this individual, instead of your own immediate response to them? We truly are a society of freaks, so it blows my mind whenever someone feels emboldened enough to judge another human being on a matter as diverse and layered as personal taste. I may be alone in this, but I’ve met so many wonderfully weird people who have the strangest hobbies and habits imaginable — some charming, some off-putting — almost all of them opening my mind and expanding my understanding of humanity. People are less intimidating, and more alike the more you get to know them, and Lars and the Real Girl represents this so, so well. At the end of my viewing of the film, I could feel tears welling up, not from sadness, but from unexpected relief and profound happiness. On the surface, this movie exudes a troubling, gloomy energy, but the tone here is not all gloom and doom. It’s a story of coming out of yourself, of learning to let yourself be loved, despite every idiosyncrasy you possess, that you’ve been conditioned to think is weird.
Life is short, and to judge one’s harmless, perceivably bizarre interests, seems like such a monumental waste of time. Gillespie wastes no time in his films, he fills every frame with palpable understanding. This movie’s Schitt’s Creek of a small-town ensemble, and really, Ryan Gosling’s astounding portrayal of this lovable weirdo, humanized weirdness in such a beautiful, effortless way — in a way that I have very rarely seen. Craig Gillespie accomplished something similarly humanizing with I, Tonya — the story of another controversial, emphatically unique figure, whom he and Margot Robbie were able to completely upend the narrative of. Even though Tonya Harding isn’t necessarily the good guy, her story can make us distrustful of the regimes and authority figures she answered to. There is no clear good guy in I, Tonya, only victims and accomplices. But Tonya Harding, a woman ostracized by the whole world, gets a chance to tell her side of the story and even be redeemed.
In a post-Free Britney world, it’s impossible not to sympathize with Tonya Harding, who, quirks aside, didn’t deserve the slander and ridicule she received. The world only knew her as a punchline, but through her retelling of history one can begin to understand Tonya a little more: how her class standing stood in the way of her success, how her rise to fame complicated things further, and how she was abused by the media, her husband, and her own family. In an interview with Kinowetter, Gillespie explained that this film is “not condoning what she’s done, just trying to understand where she’s coming from”, and this concept is really at the core of all of Gillespie’s projects. To be an outsider, to be misunderstood is a placement in society no one wants. And yet Gillespie’s choice to center his stories around outcasts only makes these figures seem more normal, more interesting, and more familiar. The recurring theme featured in each of the films I’ve discussed is isolation, however, the lens through which Gillespie chooses to view these figures allows weirdos like myself to feel less alone.
Tonya put it best when she said “America: they want someone to love, but they also want someone to hate”, and even as our society theoretically evolves, we’re still encouraged to be suspicious of those who differ from us, and maintain their marginalization rather than accepting them. The beauty of the Craig Gillespie canon is that weirdness is given a chance, not to be picked apart, but accepted and appreciated. He never lets his characters squander their individuality for the toleration of those around them, he simply accepts them as they are from the start and allows us to get to know them for who they really are. Even in his latest film Cruella, a somber, potentially tragic tale is told within a perspective of empowerment where the weirdness is undeniably chic. Though every audience member has the right to place their own judgment upon whatever weirdos they see on screen, Craig Gillespie never seems to.
Gillespie handles his weirdos with care, and does not try to make his characters something that they are not. Whether he’s dealing with a public figure or a fictional one, Craig Gillespie has a way of immersing us into a meaningful fantasy. Where weirdos get a voice, pariahs get another chance, and being different is proven to be not so different somehow. The tender, compassionate nature of a Craig Gillespie film is intoxicating and comforting, even in a tumultuous tale like I, Tonya, or an incongruous love story like Lars and the Real Girl. Gillespie is able to capture weirdness in the most genuine way, without making his weirdos suffer, change, or fit into some stifling stereotype. These weirdos have depth and emotion and are given the rare opportunity to just be themselves. We’re over a year and a half into this pandemic now, and my faith in humanity has almost shriveled into non-existence. But it’s movies like these, ones that offer a different perspective, ones that offer kindness, and patience, and even the slightest bit of understanding to even the weirdest of the weirdos that warm my heart and try to fill it with a little hope.
